If You Want to Make An Omelet…

Mike FloresThursday, March 21, 2013

rand Prix San Diego showcased eight different decks in its star-studded Top 8! The Modern format showed us at least four different looks at green midrange, the all-out aggression of Red Robots, two radically different combo decks (the winner being an echo of the most recent Modern Pro Tour winner)... and a bona fide control deck!

Nathan Holiday took down Grand Prix San Diego with an updated Eggs list, because “...two-mana Tinker for Black Lotus is a legal play.”

Holiday, of course, was referencing a Reshape for (Lotus Bloom being effectively zero here) to put Lotus Bloom directly in play. When you consider that Tinker and Black Lotus are restricted in Vintage (Magic‘s largest and most busted combo format), it is probably saying something about the strategy’s relative power level that Holiday could play four of both cards! (While other mages were “attacking for 2.”)

Essentially, Eggs plays (and sacrifices) many of these Egg-like artifacts to draw cards while staying more-or-less even on mana. Then Second Sunrise or Faith’s Reward can return many permanents to the battlefield to do it all over again!

Over the course of going off with the Eggs deck, a player might destroy some of his or her own lands with Ghost Quarter (putting both into the graveyard); get another land (of course), only to get both originals back the same turn; and, like Holiday said, start off with a mana explosion from a Lotus Bloom... which would (of course) return to play ready to produce another , , or even .

Eventually, an Eggs player can rip through his or her deck, to the point where he or she has no library. Then the Eggs player can just put back a Second Sunrise with Conjurer’s Bauble and just cast the same Second Sunrise over and over again. Once you have jumped through sufficient hoops to get to this point, you can do unlimited damage with a Pyrite Spellbomb. Easy game, right?

Affinity is an offense machine that can drop its hand in the first few turns and transform a lowly Memnite into a two-shot robot via Cranial Plating... or can build an inevitable wave of damage over time via Steel Overseer. In this deck, Galvanic Blast basically always does 4 damage for one mana; and Thoughtcast does—for generally one mana—what other decks are willing to spend three or more mana to accomplish. And what if an opponent does something super annoying with Martyr of Sands or otherwise gains infinite life? No problem! You might just kill him or her in one shot anyway by attaching Cranial Plating to Inkmoth Nexus!

As offensively capable as Robots might be, it is also one of the most flexible strategies in Modern. Glimmervoid and Mox Opal allow the deck to produce any color of mana, and because of that, it can play a wide variety of sideboard cards. Interestingly, Robots is equally at home with a Wurmcoil Engine-trumping Deglamer or (despite being a deck with only one basic land—and an Island at that) the deck is capable of stealing free games with a Blood Moon.

This particular deck is a Naya good-stuff deck focused on tough creatures. Most of Kibler’s big threats—from two-drop Tarmogoyf to three-drop Loxodon Smiter and beyond—are too big to swat with a Lightning Bolt or Lightning Helix; it should go without saying that they also fight small creatures well when combined with Domri Rade’s -2 ability.

Clearly set up to fight smaller creatures in fair decks, Kibler’s Domri Naya does not exactly lie down for “broken” angles of attack. His Noble Hierarchs and Deathrite Shamans can potentially set up a second-turn Blood Moon to cripple opposing mana bases while leaving him just enough mana flexibility to get his beat going thanks to a couple of basic Forests and one Plains. And hey, Thundermaw Hellkite is big, fast, and doesn’t care where you get its red from.

Here we have a midrange deck that essentially focuses on high-quality cards in its three colors. Where it differs from Kibler (and I suppose later Jund variants) is that Ferrando eschewed red completely for black removal (Abrupt Decay), disruption (Inquisition of Kozilek), or both (Liliana of the Veil).

This deck has some interesting graveyard and recurring advantage combinations. Of course Liliana of the Veil and Lingering Souls get along well. We have seen this in numerous places, including Modern Jund decks that simply splashed for the hyper-efficient Souls. Here, Darkblast and Life from the Loam do much the same thing: allowing Ferrando to continually get creature removal (or a powerful card-advantage engine that can especially recur his Tectonic Edges) while setting up Lingering Souls over and over again to great advantage.

From its inception, Modern has been a curious animal and work in progress as a format. Start off with no Stoneforge Mystic or Bitterblossom, counter the initial success of combo by banning Ponder and Preordain. Despite the prior success of combo decks like Eggs, I think it would be fair to say that the most prevalent strategy for many months was Jund. The format is expansive and many of the overpowered cards started off unavailable... so why not play for maximum per-card efficacy? Jund saw unparalleled efficiency at each mana point: Lightning Bolt, Tarmogoyf and Dark Confidant, Liliana of the Veil. All played bigger than their top-rights but none so much as Bloodbraid Elf.

It is interesting to see how various capable players have reacted to the loss of the Jund ace. Matt Ferrando played highly efficient individual cards sans red, while Brian Kibler kept some of the powerful—if fringe—explosive Jund elements like Lotus Cobra and Thundermaw Hellkite (even Lotus Cobra INTO Thundermaw Hellkite)... if not in “Jund” colors exactly.

When opponents try to stop your shuffling with Aven Mindcensor, force you to discard your powerful combo pieces, or attack your very land base (including, of course, the Molten Pinnacle) what’s a mage to do?

Control has certainly had its challenges in a world of such speed and card-advantageous threat cards. Sammy Tukeman made it work by focusing on per-card value himself. Lightning Bolt and Lightning Helix are great creature killers, especially when combined with Snapcaster Mage. A thin array of permission, starting on Spell Snare and Mana Leak, can help keep an opponent honest, although Cryptic Command—itself quite ace-like—is the only hard counter.

Tukeman’s big games are Ajani Vengeant (where his bountiful removal plus permission can help buy time for the ultimate) and Standard nail-in-the-coffin Sphinx’s Revelation. Because what goes better with card advantage, great instants, and value lifegain... but an instant providing more card advantage and more lifegain?

San Diego provided Modern—and Magic—fans a truly diverse format. Tons of different strategies, ways to win, and the rebirth of an old favorite finisher or two. So... how are you liking life after Bloodbraid Elf?

Michael Flores is the author of Deckade and The Official Miser's Guide; the designer of numerous State, Regional, Grand Prix, National, and Pro Tour–winning decks; and the onetime editor-in-chief of The Magic Dojo. He'd claim allegiance to Dimir (if such a Guild existed)… but instead will just shrug "Simic."